Dr Sophia Capo, O.D., FAAO

Dr Sophia Capo, O.D., FAAO Residency-Trained Optometrist | Post-Brain Injury & Pediatric Vision | Kelowna, BC

08/24/2026

I had a patient recently who stuck with me.

She was about 50 years old, post-concussion, and she came to see me after having already seen multiple different providers. No one could quite figure out why she couldn't read anymore. It wasn't a glasses issue — she was wearing updated glasses, and she could see 20/20.

But she was having issues with double vision and with focusing.

What we were able to do for her was fix her vision problem by doing the proper testing — by looking deeper into her eye coordination. From there, we prescribed a treatment plan that got her seeing better and got her back to work.

Here's the takeaway: post-injury vision care is not just glasses, and it's not just eye health. There's a whole other bucket — coordination — and after a brain injury, it's usually where the answers are.

Do you know someone still struggling with their vision after a concussion?

08/20/2026

She's six years old and getting her first pair of glasses. And honestly? This moment never gets old. 🩵

Her vision is actually doing what it should — her visual system is functioning and compensating. But her prescription is high enough that we've reached the point where we need to start supporting her with glasses, rather than letting her eyes continue to do all the work on their own.

Here's what I love about this: we're not waiting until she's struggling academically. We're not waiting until her vision "gets bad enough." We're being proactive, catching it at the right time, and giving her the support she needs before it starts costing her.

I often explain it to parents this way: at this age, I'm not necessarily prescribing the full correction all at once. I want to introduce glasses gently, let her system adapt, and check back in to make sure everything is progressing well. We start with what she needs and adjust as we go.

Here's what I've learned: early intervention with the right glasses prescription is one of the most impactful things we can do for a child's visual development. The vision got clearer with correction — and that clarity matters more at this stage than at any other.

In my experience as a pediatric optometrist in Kelowna, the families who catch this early see the best outcomes. This little girl is going to start school with her vision fully supported, and that changes what's possible for her.

08/18/2026

A farsighted child's eyes are working in overdrive every single minute of every school day. 👁️

Here's something that blows parents' minds when I explain it: farsighted kids often look like they can see just fine. They pass the school vision screening. They're not squinting. But internally, their visual system is pushing hard — all the time — just to produce a clear image.

Every time a farsighted person looks at something, their focusing system has to actively compensate for their prescription. For a mild case, that might be manageable. But when the prescription is high — like the child in this video, who was coming in at a significantly elevated plus — that's their eyes going into overdrive just to see normally. Every hour of school, every page of reading, every glance at the board.

Here's what I've learned: kids with high farsightedness are slower to adapt to visual demands and often show poorer learning outcomes — not because they aren't capable, but because their visual system is burning through energy just to function.

Some kids with more than two diopters of hyperopia are essentially running a marathon every day while everyone else is walking. And the only person who knows it is the child — who often doesn't know what normal even feels like.

She also has astigmatism, which adds blur and fluctuation on top of the focusing stress. Together, the prescription is really significant.

08/10/2026

"If something was wrong with my eyes, I'd know." False. 👁️

I see kids every single day who have no idea they can't see properly out of one eye. The most common reason? Amblyopia — or lazy eye.

It happens when the prescription is very different between the two eyes. The brain just favours the stronger eye, and the child keeps seeing fine... with the good eye doing all the work. The other eye quietly falls behind.

This is exactly why we test early — before kids even know to tell us something's wrong. 💙

As a children’s eye doctor, one of my favourite parts of what I do is having the opportunity to share knowledge with fel...
08/01/2026

As a children’s eye doctor, one of my favourite parts of what I do is having the opportunity to share knowledge with fellow optometrists.

Thank you CooperVision Canada for inviting me to join your expert panel. It’s always an honour to contribute to conversations that help advance pediatric eye care and improve outcomes for our youngest patients.

This was my first rodeo 🐎
07/12/2026

This was my first rodeo 🐎

07/09/2026

Something I have to correct all the time: 20/20 vision does NOT mean your eyes are healthy. 👁️

It's just a measure of clarity — how well you can read letters on a chart. That's it.

You can have a retinal detachment. You can have diabetic retinopathy. And still see 20/20. That's why regular eye exams go so much deeper than that one line on the chart.

20/20 is a starting point, not a finish line. 🙌

07/08/2026

We can't expect optimized school performance from a child whose vision isn't optimized first. 📚

This is something I feel really strongly about. Every single day, kids are sitting in classrooms being asked to read, write, copy from the board, and focus for hours at a time — and some of them are doing all of that while their visual system is working against them.

Here's what I've learned: when a child's vision is even slightly off, it costs them energy. They're spending cognitive resources just trying to see clearly — resources that should be going toward learning. And by the end of a school day, they're exhausted in a way that can look like a behavior problem or a lack of effort.

Something I think more parents and teachers should know: if a child is struggling at school, vision should always be ruled out first. Not because it's always the cause — but because it's one of the easiest things to identify and correct, and the difference it can make is huge.

In my Kelowna clinic, I see this pattern over and over. A child comes in labelled as a slow learner or a reluctant reader, and once we address what's going on with their eyes, something clicks. I've had parents come back months later and say, "I have a completely different kid."

That's why I'm so passionate about pediatric eye exams here in the Okanagan. Vision should be optimized before we expect anything else to be optimized.

07/04/2026

Optometry school taught me how to be a doctor but building a space where families truly feel seen, heard, and cared for?

That part I had to learn on my own.

With guidance from my family of entrepreneurs and a lot of trial and error, I realized you’ll never feel fully ready. The biggest growth comes from simply taking the first step.

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3330 Richter Street #207
Kelowna, BC
V1W4V5

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Tuesday 8am - 4pm
Wednesday 8am - 4pm
Thursday 8am - 4pm
Friday 8:30am - 4pm

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